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It's happening all too often. Parents arrested for driving drunk with at least one of their kids strapped in the back seat. What drives them to do it? A mother who once did, and is now helping others, speaks out. (Published Thursday, Feb 24, 2011)

Updated at 6:58 AM EST on Friday, Feb 25, 2011

Pat Pryor Bonica nearly gasps at the thought of what might have been.

"Only when I got sober and looked back did I realize how I could have killed people," the Bayville resident said, fighting back tears.

Top New York News Photos of 2011

Pryor Bonica, the longtime owner of a successful Hicksville recruiting business, spent 20 years in an alcoholic haze. The disease, she said, makes people "do things you would never do."

Like driving drunk with your kids in the car, which has been occurring in New York at an alarming rate over the past year.

The mother of five did that on a regular basis, she recalled during an interview with NBC New York. And she never thought twice about it.

"Your addiction becomes bigger than your logic," she said.

Since December 2009, nearly 920 New Yorkers have been arrested for driving drunk with children in the car, according to statistics from the state division of criminal justice services.

Nearly a quarter of those taken into custody are from New York City's five boroughs, Nassau, Suffolk and Westchester counties.

Many were parents driving with their own children in the car.

Those statistics have been compiled since the passage of "Leandra's Law," which made it a felony in New York state to drive drunk with a child.

The law was named for 11-year-old Leandra Rosado of the Bronx, who died in a 2009 crash. She was riding in a vehicle driven by a friend's mom, who was drunk, and the car crashed on the Henry Hudson parkway.

"It is the height of irresponsibility for a parent to drive drunk with a kid in the car," said Long Island state Sen. Charles Fuschillo (R-Merrick), a co-sponsor of the law.

"We have the toughest laws in the nation, but we have to change the mindset for this epidemic."